


Armistice

by TheBasilRathbone



Category: Lizzie Bennet Diaries, Pride and Prejudice & Related Fandoms, Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
Genre: 1940s, Alternate Universe, F/M, Injury, WWII, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-03
Updated: 2018-09-12
Packaged: 2019-07-06 13:00:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15886572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBasilRathbone/pseuds/TheBasilRathbone
Summary: 1940s AU - The war is over, and she hasn't heard from Darcy in weeks. Since she'd found out about George Wickham, they have been writing letters constantly. But it had come to a sudden, abrupt end. She fears the worst, until a tip from Jane brings her to the train station on an early Wednesday morning, waiting to greet the returning soldiers.





	1. Chapter 1

As the soldiers began to file off of the train, she rose onto the balls of her feet, instinctively seeking him out. It had been nearly two years since she had seen him in the flesh. He'd delivered the letter himself before his leave ended, his uniform tie falling neatly beneath his jacket and his hat tucked under his arm. She would later calculate it all in her head, that Darcy would have already been on the train by the time she had finished reading about George Wickham and his true character.

The letter had changed things, certainly, but it wasn't until Wickham had coerced Lydia, with tales of certain death and the horrors of war, into a night of passion before he was shipped out the next morning that Darcy was once again brought into her life. Upon finding out about the impending child, Lydia had attempted to write to George, only to be told that there was no one in his regiment by that name. Lizzie wasn't sure why, but she had confided in Darcy, merely asking him if he knew the location of his old friend. Instead of replying in the negative, he had used his connections to track down George Wickham, who was revealed to be a clerk working in a military office who had gotten out of active service with a claim of gastritis. He had feigned being on leave from the war when he was sent to run errands in Meryton. Not only that, but he had recently been disciplined for a fight with his superior after the elder man discovered Wickham's affair with his daughter. Mrs. Bennet had pleaded with Lydia to confront him, to demand marriage, but Lydia had refused. Her elder sisters, in treating severe injuries and building machinery in factories, had been more of an influence in independent behaviour than Mrs. Bennet would have liked. Darcy had called in more favours and arranged a job and place of residence for her, and Lydia became just one of many single mothers after the war, assumed to have been left widowed and treated without judgement. Lizzie had just visited her a few weeks ago, and both her sister and and her niece were getting on splendidly.

To Darcy, she had written and discarded dozens of letters, finally summoning the courage to drop one into the post box, lingering for nearly fifteen minutes in the agony of regret afterwards. But he had received it, and written his reply. 

From there, they exchanged countless letters. At first, he wrote formally and only in response to her own correspondence. However, as the war progressed, she began to receive them in mass, sometimes several times a week, sending her own as often as she could. He shared with her his darker experiences of the war, and she in turn confided in him the horrors she had heard on the radio and the swirling rumours at her factory job. She also made an effort to cheer him, sending him anything and everything she could manage that she thought might brighten his spirits. 

While Lizze's own discomfort about her tumultuous relationship with Darcy had been greatly soothed, not everyone was as pleased with the change. Namely his aunt, Catherine de Bourgh. Coming across the woman in town, Lizzie had awkwardly tried to make conversation, mentioning her nephew and that his most recent letter had assured her that he was alive and well. This had evidently not been the right thing to say, as the older woman berated her in the middle of the shop, accusing her of attempting to seduce her wealthy nephew while he was emotionally vulnerable and condemning her for serving as a distraction that would surely get him killed. Humiliated but refusing to agree to cease her communication with Darcy, Lizzie had nearly forgotten her ration book in her haste to exit the shop. Her mother would have lost her head: her biggest wartime concern after the disappearance of eligible young men to war had been the rationing of "decent" food and the altogether unobtainability of her favoured imported items. 

Lizzie had not shared her encounter with Catherine de Bourgh with Darcy, but evidently the old woman had written him a rather passionate letter about what she perceived to be Lizzie's ulterior motives and many faults, most prominently her refusal to end her correspondence with him (for his own good). The last letter she had received before the end of the war had been his expression of relief and hope, revealing that his feelings had remained unchanged in the two years since they'd met and assuring her that, if she wasn't interested, he would never mention it again.

The next morning, she woke to the news that the war was over. While her factory job ended quickly, Jane's own nursing job was as in-demand as ever, at least for a while. While it made the reunion between Jane and her own soldier a bit more rushed than the pair undoubtedly would have liked, Lizzie had to admit some jealousy. She was suddenly unemployed and entirely lost _._ She ached for something to do, to feel useful. 

It didn't help that soldiers were being unloaded from the trains by the droves and still she hadn't heard from Darcy. While the first couple of weeks were understandable, as more time began to pass, the more panicked she had become. What if something had happened to him? The uncertainty of her response to his letter began to fade away as her panic grew. She would never be able to tell him that his feelings were requited, because of course they were. How could they not be? 

So it was when Jane telephoned the Bennet household to inform Lizzie that Darcy had arrived at her infirmary and was only to spend a night there before being shipped off onto the earliest train the following morning, Lizzie hadn't hesitated. She'd had weeks of waiting. Years. _He's been injured, Lizzie,_ Jane had warned, _he's coming in with the infirmed soldiers._  A determined and capable war-time worker, Lizzie had suddenly become one of the thousands who were wringing their hands in anxiety, waiting to hear the fate of their loved ones. It had all happened so gradually she hadn't realized when the change had occurred. 

Regardless, she found herself waiting for the train, the steam of the engine sending a wave of heat through the station as it pulled up to the platform. While the sudden sea of military uniforms is the most striking visual once the train stops, the second is the bandages. Around heads, around the blunt ends of missing limbs, tied around arms in a sling. Mostly clean, some starting to lightly bleed through. They parted around her, a living parade of the effects of the war, and Lizzie forced herself not to shudder at the thought of what Darcy had gone through, what they all had gone through. 

And suddenly, he was there, his height an easy advantage to find him. He wore his uniform hat, but his dark hair was still visible from beneath the brim as he strode past her, unseeing. 

"Darcy!" she shouted, trying to weave through the crowds of reuniting lovers and mothers and sons. "William Darcy! Darcy!" She caught the sleeve of his jacket, and he turned, a look of disappointment on his face that she had seen so often directed at her. She just hadn't expected it now. But as he turned towards her, she saw the extent of his injury. Beyond his arm bound in a gauzy sling, a significant portion of his right cheek was burned, now healed but still shiny and mottled from the fire. The scar ran from his jaw, along his hairline and diffused at his temple. 

The look on her face must have made him uneasy, because he merely said, "a grenade," by way of explanation, his chin tilted down stiffly towards his chest, "two days before Armistice." It was as if they hadn't exchanged those intimate letters at all, his posture so stiff and uneasy towards her, and if Lizzy hadn't kept each one bundled neatly in her bedside table, she might have believed it was all a dream.

"You didn't write to tell me you were injured," she said finally. "I would have written you, but with the war over, I had no idea where to address my letters."

"I didn't see the point," he replied bluntly. "I should go, I've made arrangements for a car to be waiting for me." 

She really had tried to work on her quickness to anger since she'd realized how very wrong her first judgements had been, but she had an undeniable temper. "You didn't see the point in writing to tell me that you were alive?" she cried, hurrying next to him as he took long strides through the crowds. "After what you wrote to me-"

"The contents of that letter are irrelevant," he said tersely, stopping short when she began to tug at his sleeve again. 

Lizzie felt her heart sink. "Irrelevant?" she asked, a bit winded from the dash through the station. "Have you changed your mind then? Your aunt's disapproval of me got you thinking and you've decided that I'm beneath you?" Anger again flared, and she could practically see Jane sighing and shaking her head in disapproval. 

" _Look at me,"_ Darcy hissed, grabbing her arm and dragging her closer. It was a startling move: she had always been the one between them prone to heated flares of anger, and Darcy was an expert at icy indifference. But he held her arm firm until she looked up at him, at his intense eyes and burned skin. "Any chance you may have given me was dashed in the moment that _this_ happened." He gestured to his face.

"Do you think so little of me?" she said finally, holding her ground and tilting her chin up defiantly. 

"It's not an insult to you. Anything that has ever attracted women to me, my wealth or my family, rendered you completely indifferent. I was never as handsome as Jane's suitor, perhaps, but I didn't think I was a beastly-looking man at least. That held no sway over you either, you despised me. You weren't attracted to my money and any attraction to my appearance that you may have had, however reluctantly, is gone now, too."

"And what about Lydia?" she asked finally. "And resolving things with your friend so that he and Jane could reconcile? What about all of those letters you wrote to me? You don't think I came to see the kind of person you were? That I had been mistaken?"

"I knew that you had found out that it was me who intervened. Pitiful as I may be, I'm not going to degrade myself with a relationship based on pity or gratitude any more than you were willing to attach yourself to someone for their money," he said firmly, the dignity he tried to summon dampened by his evident self-consciousness. 

"For a man with as expensive an education as you had, you really are dense." She threw her arms around his neck, pulling him down to kiss him in the middle of the station. He remained still, and when Lizzie pulled away she couldn't help but smile at his dazed expression. "Does that clarify anything for you?"

"A bit. But I think my mind is struggling to catch up," he responded, removing his hat before leaning down again, wrapping his good arm around her waist and kissing her again. He kissed like a drowning man trying to pull the very air from her lungs. His large palm pressed against the small of her back, and from her toes to her lips she seemed to be pushed against him. Perhaps a stiff and awkward man at first meeting, she was privately thrilled that his icy calm demeanor didn't impact every aspect of his life. Certainly not this. 

When they finally pulled apart, he looked shaken. "I thought...when I first saw myself in the mirror after I woke up in the nurse's station..."

"If my feelings about you couldn't be swayed by your money or your fancy house or your rich friends, why on earth did you think that my feelings would change because you got a scar? I am grateful, Darcy, I always will be for what you've done for Lydia, but you should know me well enough by now to know that I don't do anything that I don't want to do."

That got a laugh out of him, finally. "No, you certainly do not," he smirked, hand trailing up to push a lock of hair behind her ear. "I love you. That hasn't changed."

"I love you, too," she confessed, a sudden burst of shyness causing her to wrap her arms around his waist and bury her face into his chest. "Thank God you're back. When I didn't hear from you..."

"I wasn't sure if you wanted to hear from me," he replied quietly, holding her tightly with his good arm. "I thought your letters were born from obligation and gratitude, after what happened with your sister. But any pride I might have had before the war disappeared quite quickly. I was desperate to hear from you, hear about home. The other men received letters from their fathers and mothers, from their sisters and wives or girlfriends. I only heard from Georgiana. It was...a comfort, however grim, to think that there was more than one person in this world that might care if I died. I didn't mind in the moment if you felt obligated to write, I just needed someone to talk to."

"There are plenty of people who care," she protested. "The first letter was out of gratitude, I couldn't keep silent. But after that, it was my own doing. I looked forward to your letters more than anything.  I'm still angry at you for not contacting me. I was worried sick."

"I'm sorry," he said softly. "I'm sorry. I never thought that you might have such a concern for me. I wanted it badly, of course, but-"

"You wrote me that letter," she interrupted. "You told me that you had hope after your meeting with your aunt. You wouldn't have written that unless you thought there was a possibility of my loving you."

"I regretted writing that letter as soon as I sent it. I thought that I would never hear back from you. It was written in a weak moment, and I was rather ashamed of it, but it had already been sent. Now I'm glad that I did."

"You were ashamed of your feelings for me?" she asked, feeling the same pain in her gut as she had when he had confessed his love the first time. 

"Not ashamed of my feelings. Ashamed that I allowed myself to ruin what small friendship we had built over our correspondence by confessing them. Now I know that it wasn't ruined, but I was afraid. After our disastrous first encounter, I would have gladly never spoken of the matter again if it meant that I could keep you in my life. In whatever small way. When the war ended...I was both glad and bitter. Perhaps you would decide that it was merely the highly emotional atmosphere of the war that brought us closer and would afterwards move on with your life. To think that I finally had you, at least in some way, and then would lose you again..."

Lizzie hummed against his chest. "Your aunt was right. For a man in the midst of a war, I certainly caused you a lot of pain and confusion and distraction."

"You gave me a reason to hope. To believe that if I survived the war and made it back, my life might be made better."

"I hope it has," she said, hands nervously running along the lapels of his jacket and down the length of his tie. After all of this time as a distant figure, the reality of having him here was overwhelming. 

"Marry me, Lizzie." It very well might have been the first time he had referred to her as anything other than a polite 'Miss Bennet,' let alone use her nickname. Quite a time to pull that particular card. "Please." She pulled back enough to look up at Darcy, one hand on his waist and one reaching up to stroke his mottled cheek. For all his shame of it, Lizzie didn't think he had ever looked so handsome.

"Why don't we start with dinner, first?" she responded with a smile, her old bravado finding itself. "It's been two years, after all."

He smiled again, tilting his head to rest firmly against her palm. "It's still early. Breakfast?"

"My treat. You're a returning soldier, after all." She took his hand and before he could protest, shouldered his duffle bag herself. "Come on. I know a place."

"People will stare." 

His shoulders sagged, an unconscious motion to make himself less visible. Her heart ached. "People can stare all they like," she said firmly, threading her arm through his as they walked, his posture beginning to straighten again at her words. "I've never been more proud to be seen with anyone in my life."


	2. BONUS CHAPTER

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The war is over, and Lizzie and Darcy find themselves ahead of their time and restricted by the societal expectations in which they must live.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really debated posting this, I didn't plan to make a second chapter, but after the positive comments and messages I received, I thought I would post. I hope this doesn't disappoint or mess with anyone's enjoyment of the first part. Feel free to reject this as not really part of the first chapter.

She trailed her fingers up and down his spine, watching him shiver despite the warmth of the room. He lay on his stomach on the bed of the hotel, head resting on his crossed arms, looking like he might fall into a content sleep at any moment, despite the early hour.

He avoided falling asleep in front of her, and she wondered often if he was plagued by nightmares of the war. Jane had confessed to her own husband's cries jarring her awake at all hours, though it seemed to be fading in time. For all her suspicions, she had nothing to confess in turn. She had never spent the night. 

"I should go."

"I wish you wouldn't." 

Lizzie rose anyways, beginning to gather her things from the floor. He watched her pull her slip over her head, turning onto his side and propping himself up in an elbow, white sheets draped over his hips. She'd seen a photograph of Greek sculpture in a book, some river god, an impressive show of muscle and strength despite its reclined posture. Darcy may have been thinner and lacking the flowing hair, but it was a spitting image nonetheless. 

"The mistress of the boarding house I'm staying at would have a fit if I was late, off being ravaged by a man," she replied, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling her stockings gently up her legs. She could barely afford to replace them should they get a tear, and she had never been a particularly delicate woman in any regard. 

"A solution to that, of course, would be to move out."

"And in with you? How scandalous, Mr. Darcy. My mother would never recover."

"There's a solution to that, as well." He slid closer, drawing himself up and pressing a kiss to her shoulder blade, hands straying around her waist. He turned to press the scarred side of his face into her skin, inhaling deeply. The war injury had improved somewhat, though it continued to earn him stares from strangers. Beyond herself, the person who had probably taken his injury best in stride had been her own mother, who had taken the scar as just another excuse to brag to everyone who would listen about how brave her daughter's soldier sweetheart had been during the war. 

She remained silent. They'd had this conversation so many times, and only more so during the last few months. He held her tightly around the waist despite her half-hearted attempts to pull away. 

"I really do have to go."

He sighed, finally releasing his hold and sitting back on the bed. Despite their franticness, he had still managed to neatly sling her dress over the back of the armchair in the corner.

"Lizzie...have I done something? Have I  _not_ done something?"

"You haven't done anything wrong," she said, again.

"It feels as though I have. You keep rebuffing me. Is it...our past? Do you doubt me still? Or perhaps you're still unsure. My appearance-"

She did stop, then, kneeling on the bed and cupping his jaw with her hands. "Stop it," she commanded, pressing a kiss against his forehead, then his ruined cheek, then his lips. "There is nothing wrong with you. I love you, you know that."

"And yet you still won't marry me," he mumbled. 

Lizzie sighed, pulling away. They'd just talk in circles forever. "Please, not now. I told you that I wanted time."

"I didn't realize you needed so much of it," he replied,  pulling the sheets further up, a flimsy barrier against the coming storm. "What can I do, Lizzie? I want to be with you."

"You are with me. Why can't we continue on as we are?" 

"You know what I mean!" he argued. "I want to be by your side. To be able to include you in my life, to be included in yours. I am tired of dining out and a sneaky night in a hotel to avoid tarnishing reputations. It feels...cheap. Like some torrid affair, not a relationship. I don't understand it. You say you want someday to be married, to have children...and yet you won't entertain the idea of pursuing it. Do you resist the idea of getting married or merely the idea of being married to me?"

"It isn't..." she sighed, wanting desperately to turn and flee from this conversation. Why was this so difficult? Why was everything between them so difficult? "Since the war ended I've been so...restless. I moved into the city and found a job, and that helped. Even if I'm just a clerk, at least I'm doing something. I keep waiting to feel relaxed and ready to settle down, and I'm still waiting. I can't bear the thought of being a housewife, spending all day at home, baking and waiting for you to come home with a cocktail in hand. It's what my mother did and it's what Jane is doing, and I don't begrudge them that choice, but it's...not for me. I'll go mad."

He was silent for a long moment. "Is that your objection? Your only objection, all this time?"

"Don't be patronizing. It isn't what I want."

"I have never asked that of you."

"But that's what happens, isn't it? The second I marry, my job will be given to a single woman, or a man. Jobs are scarce, they don't waste them on women who aren't forced to work to make ends meet. I love you, but marriage isn't enough to fulfill me."

"But you would be a Darcy."

"Yes, I'm aware of that. And I know your family name carries a certain gravitas, but I'm not going to throw away all of my desires and ambitions so that I can raise myself up in the world to be a 'Darcy.' I'm not my mother."

It was a rather cruel thing to say, not in the least as a snarky reference to his initial disastrous confession. She would apologize later, but Darcy only sighed at her.

"That isn't what I meant, Elizabeth. The Darcy name does carry a certain...weight...to it, yes, but I merely intended to suggest that you use it to your advantage. You would have contacts that could find you a place of employment. Meaningful employment. You could start a business of your own, if you wanted. Work for charities, save lives, change our culture. Being a wife does not doom you to a life of boredom. Perhaps it isn't the way that things are normally done, but nothing about our relationship has been the normal way of things. I can't see why our marriage should be any different."

Shamed at his kind reaction to her defensive words, she sat back down beside him, wrapping one arm around his waist and pressing a kiss to his shoulder. "I would feel inferior. The only reason I would have those positions would be because my husband insisted."

"You would be there to prove them wrong, Lizzie. Your connections may play advantage to you but nothing but your own work would solidify your worth. Do you think that all of the men in executive positions are there because of their virtues? Of course not. Rise the ranks above them all and hire an army of capable women who didn't have your same marital advantage."

"Save lives, change the culture?" she offered with a small smile. 

"Precisely."

"And you wouldn't be unhappy with a wife that is too busy working to bake and play maid?"

"I've tasted your baking. Finding you employment would save me from a great deal of sickness."

For all of his seriousness, he could make her laugh like no one else. She slid her palms across his shoulders and down his back, pulling him into a kiss. "If that weren't true I would be terribly insulted."

He hummed in response. "My wealth, the wealth we would share, is a privilege. We can afford to have childcare, have someone to keep the house. Perhaps in marrying me you would have to make a sacrifice, but I meant it when I vowed to give you everything that is in my power to give. A career, a family... you wouldn't have to choose. I would never ask you to."

She kissed his cheek softly, resting her head in the crook of his neck. "Why are you so good to me?"

He didn't answer answer her, merely resting his temple against her forehead. "I've lost my sense of propriety. I no longer care what my life should look like. I want only to be able to wake up content every morning, and I can't do that without you waking up beside me. You waking up  _happy_ beside me."

"And you won't change your mind?"

"If I do, you'll change it back. You are a force to be reckoned with, Lizzie Bennet, I wouldn't have it any differently." 

After a few long moments, she finally managed to extract herself after several drawn-out kisses and lingering touches. "I really do need to go."

"But you will consider it, then? Marriage, I mean. I'm not trying to be demanding, I'm merely eager to have some stability in my life after feeling like I might lose everything at a moment's notice."

"Tuesday," she said simply. "Your sister is in town, right?"

"You'll have an answer for me on Tuesday?" The rumpled hair and absence of his perfectly tailored suit made him look much younger than he was. "Georgiana will be here all week, why?"

"My parents are here visiting Jane and her husband and little Charles. I finish work early on Tuesday and can meet you at the courthouse at noon. We could be married before the city finishes its lunch."

"You're joking."

"If you of all people don't believe me when I propose, than we don't have a hope of convincing anyone else to show up at the wedding," she said with a grin, unceremoniously pushing pins into her hair until it resembles something proper.

"Was that a proposal?" he asked at last. "Because if so, it was terribly unromantic."

He may not have been the smug, conceited man she once thought, but he was certainly quite pleased with himself now. Lizzie once again moved towards him, placing both of her knees on the bed by his side and leaning over him, hands slipping underneath his sharp jawline. "Dearest, Loveliest William," she cooed, shushing his snort of laughter. "I couldn't care less about having a white wedding, I just want the certificate that says we belong to each other. Marry me."

"What will you give me to tempt me?"

"I vow to never bake again. From now on, it's bakery-bought or nothing."

He made a bright sound of interest, burying his hands in her hair (the pins be damned) and dragging her down for a kiss. "Then how could I say no?"


End file.
